James Benjamin v. John Stemple, 915 F.3d 1066

Background

Saginaw, Michigan ordinance requires owners of vacant properties to register and sign a form consenting to city entry if the property "becomes dangerous as defined by" local dangerous-building rules.
Rebekah C. Benjamin Trust (James Benjamin trustee) and intervenor Bobby and Sylvia Jones refused to sign, were fined, and sued city officials claiming the registration condition violated the Fourth Amendment by forcing consent to future warrantless searches.
The district court dismissed the complaint for failure to state a claim and denied a preliminary injunction; owners appealed both rulings.
The registration condition permits entry only after an administrative process: inspector’s preliminary finding, notice and a hearing before a non-employee hearing officer, post-hearing determination, enforcement steps, and judicial review rights.
Plaintiffs argued the form waived a cognizable Fourth Amendment right to resist warrantless entry; the city argued the administrative-search exception and the ordinance’s precompliance-review procedures justified warrantless entry when a building is finally declared dangerous.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the registration form imposes an unconstitutional condition by requiring consent to future warrantless entry	The form forces owners to waive Fourth Amendment protections as a condition of registering vacant property	The form only permits entry after the ordinance’s administrative process determines a building is dangerous, an exception to the warrant requirement	Held: No unconstitutional condition; no cognizable Fourth Amendment right to resist entry under the ordinance when administrative precompliance review occurs
Whether warrantless entry to remediate dangerous buildings is per se unreasonable	Plaintiffs: Such entries require a warrant or cannot be consented away in advance	City: Administrative-search exception applies to building-safety inspections and the ordinance provides procedural safeguards	Held: Administrative-search exception applies; precompliance review by a neutral decisionmaker satisfies the Fourth Amendment
Whether Saginaw’s administrative process provides meaningful precompliance review	Plaintiffs: Process is deficient (no judicial warrant requirement, unclear neutral standards, no subpoena mechanism)	City: Process includes notice, hearing before a neutral non-employee officer, evidentiary rights, appeal and judicial review—satisfying Patel’s minimal requirement	Held: Process provides adequate precompliance review and procedural protections
Whether state-law emergency-entry provisions create a separate unconstitutional risk	Plaintiffs: State fire-officer statute could allow entry without the administrative process	City: State provision governs only true emergencies, which are exigent and independently justify warrantless entry; argument was forfeited on appeal	Held: Emergency-entry statute does not change outcome and was forfeited on appeal

Key Cases Cited

Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (stop-and-frisk scope and Fourth Amendment principles)
Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143 (searches incident to investigatory stops)
Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752 (search incident to arrest limits)
Kentucky v. King, 563 U.S. 452 (warrantless-entry presumptions and exigent-circumstances doctrine)
City of Los Angeles v. Patel, 576 U.S. 409 (administrative-search exception requires precompliance review before a neutral decisionmaker)
Griffin v. Wisconsin, 483 U.S. 868 (reduced Fourth Amendment protections for probationers)
New York v. Burger, 482 U.S. 691 (warrantless inspections of closely regulated businesses)
City of Ontario v. Quon, 560 U.S. 746 (government employer searches and privacy expectations)
New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325 (student-search standards in schools)
Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520 (searches of inmates and limited privacy expectations)
Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U.S. 523 (administrative searches for housing-code enforcement)
Liberty Coins, LLC v. Goodman, 880 F.3d 274 (6th Cir.) (administrative-search precompliance-review requirement applies in local enforcement context)
Edward J. DeBartolo Corp. v. Florida Gulf Coast Building & Construction Trades Council, 485 U.S. 568 (construction of consent and waiver provisions)
Kentucky v. Tyler, 436 U.S. 499 (warrantless entry during and after fires can be justified by exigent circumstances)
Sanborn v. Parker, 629 F.3d 554 (forfeiture of issues not raised in initial briefing)
McGirr v. Rehme, 891 F.3d 603 (preliminary-injunction likelihood-of-success standard)